First Mover Advantages

The use of a fairly standard vehicle width of a little under 2 meters originates from the design of prehistoric carts and sleds as evidenced by rutting in ancient roads which aided in steering. Despite dramatic advances in vehicular and infrastructural technologies, the standard has changed little over the millennia. The gauges of railroad track, for instance, are now standardized at 4 feet 8 and half inches (1435 mm) across Europe and North America, the same as the first steam railway, and a mere half-inch wider than the typical pre-steam tracks in the mining districts near Newcastle, consistent in size with the wheel gauge used in Roman Britain. This standard gauge lasted since it was first used on the Stockton and Darlington railway in 1825, and were adopted by most subsequent lines (Puffert, 2002), despite some railways trying alternatives (e.g. the Great Western Railway was originally built at 5 feet 6 inches, or 1676 mm). Alternative gauges would have accommodated wider, taller, and faster trains more easily, but the standard gauge that was adopted first acquired advantages as other railways sought compatibility with the standard to obtain access to the uses of earlier lines, and helped lock-in that standard.